Radical Changes at MREmag

[Ross34]

I'm sure that will be welcome and could be a success like the current American version MRH: http://mrhpub.com/2016-10-oct/online/

 

 

G.

 

 

Thanks for the link Grahame... I didn't even know MRH existed. ....and it free!

 

What a great website and resource . I've spent all morning reading the back issues.

 

I have to say, I think the Americans, in many ways, appear to be a lot more forward thinking in their approach to the hobby than here in the UK.

[602Squadron]

I suspect I may be one of the much criticised "long winded correspondents", but in my defence may I say that my motivation in writing to MREmag was to share what knowledge and experience I may have acquired over many years of modelling, research and railway management, with those who wanted to know. Depending on the subject, this can sometimes be difficult to do in less than 200 words. Yes, some threads did ramble on a bit (rucksacks at exhibitions anyone?), but personally I found "Having Your Say" an interesting forum, above all conducted in a spirit of mutual respect that is, unfortunately, unusual in certain parts of the online community.

 

I await developments, but I would again like to express my appreciation for Phil's hard work and the contributions made by all the regular contributors, particularly Brian Macdermott and the poll team. I hope we can remain in touch in the future through whatever replaces MREmag.

 

Bernard Hulland

[BMacdermott]

Hello Bernard

 

Very many thanks for your kind words - they will be passed to The Poll Team. I have always valued your postings and look forward to being able to keep in touch.

 

Kind regards

 

Brian

[Hroth]

I read the notice on their website and I must say that I am unimpressed by their hosting company. A major error has occurred in the hosting program, and the customer has to pay to have it fixed. To me that is unacceptable, and the hosting company should pay some compensation to them for the lack of advertising income while they are forcibly offline.,.

Its not necessarily anything to do with the hosting company.

 

I've never looked "under the floorboards" but its possible that MREmag uses a third party software solution to present the mag, and that runs on the hardware managed by the hosting company.  Its also possible that there's an interaction between the software, the database system used and memory issues that have caused the meltdown. As the persons using the external software solution are responsible for the maintanance of that software, then unless there is a maintenance contract between the user (ie MREmag) and the software supplier, any problems that need to be sorted out will have to be paid for on an ad-hoc basis.

 

That sort of thing never comes cheap!

[Budgie]

That sort of thing never comes cheap!

As a professional programmer before I retired, I know that only too well (as I was usually the one charging!).

[northendboy]

Another vote of thanks to Phil Parker for the MREMag stewardship, I really liked his comments and he occasionally nailed one or two people who may have been a bit unruly.

 

I found it a slightly more pleasant environment than this forum can be, particularly in the reviews where one or two very dominant personalities really force their opinions onto review threads which stopped me contributing my two penn'orth.

 

Thanks also to Brian for his polls and discovery of some lovely film segments to watch with my tea.

 

Cheers chaps.

[metadyneman]

Dunno about anyone else, but I'm really missing my thrice weekly read. I contributed quite a lot to it when Pat Hammond ran it but took a back seat what Phil Parker took over, it was still good and definitely kept up the spirit of what it was. It was a very good way of passing the morning with a coffee whilst pretending to do some work. I feel MREMag has essentially died from what it originally was and although I wish the current team all the best, the proposals have killed it and it will never recover from this radical  change

[BMacdermott]

Hello Metadyneman

 

I'm sure many of us feel very sad about the demise of 'the old MREmag' - but I'll be keeping an open mind about the 'new one' for the time being.

 

The overwhelming majority of people who have been in touch with me wanted to keep the edited version of 'Have Your Say', so it remains to be seen as to whether yet another forum will actually work. To my mind, it had a unique quality that many appreciated.

 

The eMag is an entirely different subject, although the two will no doubt be inextricably linked.

 

Fingers crossed!

 

Brian

[Legend]

I'm also missing my MREmag fix.

 

I think when Pat started it it was to continue on from the original mag which had just stopped publishing. I don't know why he did it but I got the impression it was his own enthusiasm that drove it on a hobby basis . As it got bigger it got more demanding on his time , so he reduced it to thrice weekly and then handed it over to the current organisation with Simon Kohler etc. this is run on a commercial basis and where it's gone wrong . Apparently there is not enough advertising income to sustain paying Phil a decent salary for his time and support running expenses.

 

It is hard to avoid the conclusion that the only way MREmag could have survived, in the way we know and love, is for someone, or a group, to take it on on a hobby basis. Certainly if I were retired I think I would quite enjoy it, although admit to having no clue about electronic publishing or hosting services. Still I'm sure something could have been possible on the occasional donation basis, just as RMWeb did before the BRM investment.

 

However I do think the existing Board are not quite in touch. It looks like MREmag will morph into a new emagazine published every two months initially. Sorry but that's not the MREmag! Apparently this is better for advertisers. I struggle with this. I wonder if the Board has just done a Beeching and not considered the extent to which the branches ( a regular having your say) feed into the main network ( the emagazine). Surely they should maintain the edited and managed forum thrice weekly with links into the new emagazine . In that way the new emagazine would be better supported and more attractive to advertisers. Without that, well it's just another emagazine published at less frequency than the mainstream mags. I just can't see that working or being sustainable.

 

As an aside how many of us actually looked at any of the adverts? I was aware of the Hattons header but that was about it. Again I come back to the only way this can be maintained is on a hobby/ volunteer basis. Commercially I just can't see it

[jonny777]

I'm also missing my MREmag fix.

 

I think when Pat started it it was to continue on from the original mag which had just stopped publishing. I don't know why he did it but I got the impression it was his own enthusiasm that drove it on a hobby basis .

 

I think you have hit the nail on the head there Legend; and the moral of the story is pretty obvious. If we want to continue a thrice weekly (or even daily as it used to be) "MREmag-style" website, someone (or maybe more than one) with more time and enthusiasm than sense is going to have to step up and volunteer to create a replica themselves.

[jonny777]

Well, my comment appears to have stopped this thread stone dead, which is a shame.

 

Of course, I am not oblivious to the obvious riposte - therefore....

 

I would volunteer myself if I had the model railway contacts and the programming knowledge to create a rolling webpage with accurate product information; but I don't, although I do have more enthusiasm than sense.

[peterl]

As a professional programmer before I retired, I know that only too well (as I was usually the one charging!).

 

Jane

The link to your garden railway doesn't appear to be working.

 

Peter

[Budgie]

Jane

The link to your garden railway doesn't appear to be working.

 

Peter

Yes, I know. Virgin media has stopped doing private webspace, and I am still trying to decide which web supplier to go with.

[autocoach]

So is there any hope for the successor to MREMag? If so how will anyone really know? I check the site but it has been unchanged now for 2 weeks.  I followed MREMag before I became aware of RMWEB. In the early days Pat Hammond's announcements of new products were the only way to know if something new was being made.

 

On the subject of  the Model Railroad Hobbyist eMag.  Joe Fugate has commented at one time that the overall operation is only profitable because of the sales of feature video programs on the Trainmaster TV store. Most of the TM Video topics have unfortunately not been of interest to me.  However, I would hate to loose MRH.  It is lively and feature packed and totally replaces the somewhat moribund Model Railroader magazine. I have a bias as a lot of the content relates to western US railroads which I model. Having local Bay Area modelers Tony Thompson and Jack Burgess as regular contributors is a very strong plus. (Jack went so far as to provide the Sketchup 3D printing files for download from his masterpiece latest project: The Bagby Hotel on the Yosemite Railroad.)  Although articles deal with subjects from all over the US and Canada (I think I have seen stuff on Mexico too) it does seem to have a skew towards the Western US and Canada. Fine by me but that may put off died in the maroon wool Pensy fans.

 

MR has an online version but they require (last time I looked) a subscription to the paper version. I actually buy a copy of the paper version every month just to support my local hobby store. 10 minutes and I am done with it. It has a sameness every issue and seems to reflect the upper Midwest  Milwaukee as a regional bias.  

 

However, the once defunct Model Railroad Craftsman (need to change that to Craftsperson) has been resurrected by White River Publications and become an excellent magazine with  articles for the journeyman (or journeyperson) level of expertise.  Always worth a read. I haven't detected any regional skewing in the new Craftsman.  The old Hal Carstens version seemed to have every other article on New Jersey or New England.

 

Enough of my curmudgeonly comments. 

 

Hope MREMag can return and I would love if it developed into a British version of MRH.  Sorry about the competition Andy and BRM (to which I do have a paid online subscription.)

Edited November 13, 2016 by autocoach

[luke_stevens]

Does anyone know where the results of the 2016 wish list have gone?

 

I was expecting them to appear somewhere if not on the former MRE website.

 

Is there any chance of them being posted here?

 

Luke

[teaky]

http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/116458-results-the-wishlist-poll-2016/

[luke_stevens]

http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/116458-results-the-wishlist-poll-2016/

Thank you!

 

I'd been looking here and hadn't seen a link.

 

Luke

[metadyneman]

This post has been modified by the author as it was not correct and an apology is made further down the thread

Edited November 14, 2016 by metadyneman

[Mike Bellamy]

The website crash in my opinion .. and it is only my opinion.. has been constructed to divert us all away and get us all used to the fact it will never be as it was, ever again.

 

 

Not true.

 

I have known both Phil Parker and Terry Rowe (one of the new owners) for a number of years and I spoke to them both separately at the Narrow Gauge show at Swanley a couple of weeks ago. The crash was totally unexpected, completely outside of their control and for various technical reasons irretrievable. About a month's worth of contributions were lost and gone for ever, causing a great amount of upset to the whole team, but in particular to Phil who had put it all together.

 

You are however correct to say that it won't be the same when it returns but you cannot blame that on the crash.

 

.

[Kiwi]

I agree that it is verging on the ridiculous to think anyone would want or need to crash a web site for any reason let alone the reasons being touted by conspiracy theorists.

 

I also agree MRE will not be the same when it returns - thank goodness in my opinion. That's not a reflection on the content though, as much of that was excellent, and I have the greatest respect for the hardworking people involved.

 

But the presentation was terrible by today's standards, and hard to follow. I say this from two perspectives: first as a very new reader, and second as a web site site designer / programmer.

 

I am really looking forward to the new development and hoping it will be designed to perform well on the smart phones and tablets that now constitute well above 50% of the devices used to access the internet. That will be imperative if new readers like me are going to be drawn to the new MRE - a fact of life whether the "old guard" like it or not.

[Phil Parker]

Not wishing to pour oil on troubled waters but I fear we have lost the MReMAG we knew and loved,  forever. The website crash in my opinion .. and it is only my opinion.. has been constructed to divert us all away and get us all used to the fact it will never be as it was, ever again. It would have been far better to just say "That's all folks" and start up something new, rather than draw out something that will never be the same again. Personally I am bitterly disappointed that it has gone, and I won't be warming to a forum type "have your say" website. MREMag grew into something that in the end, no one could finish properly. Instead we get a test card!

Do you have any facts to back your insulting and potentially libellous "opinion"?

 

Of course not, because it isn't true.

 

If the site had been deliberately crashed, I wouldn't have wasted several hours the day before putting together a really good, full issue which I was very disappointed never appeared. Nor would I have been spending idle moments planning a final editorial to draw a neat close to old MREmag.

 

Of course, in your "opinion" what I've just written is untrue.

 

Whatever new MREmag looks like, and I'm not involved so have no idea of the plans, it's development isn't going to be helped if advertisers are scared away by "opinion" like this. Let them get on with it, after all you have the luxury of being able do nothing other than sitting back and waiting, unlike those working to bring you more entertainment for free.

[ELTEL]

Do you have any facts to back your insulting and potentially libellous "opinion"?

Of course not, because it isn't true.

If the site had been deliberately crashed, I wouldn't have wasted several hours the day before putting together a really good, full issue which I was very disappointed never appeared. Nor would I have been spending idle moments planning a final editorial to draw a neat close to old MREmag.

Of course, in your "opinion" what I've just written is untrue.

Whatever new MREmag looks like, and I'm not involved so have no idea of the plans, it's development isn't going to be helped if advertisers are scared away by "opinion" like this. Let them get on with it, after all you have the luxury of being able do nothing other than sitting back and waiting, unlike those working to bring you more entertainment for free.

Hi Phil

 

Well said.

 

Terry

[cctransuk]

Not wishing to pour oil on troubled waters but I fear we have lost the MReMAG we knew and loved,  forever. The website crash in my opinion .. and it is only my opinion.. has been constructed to divert us all away and get us all used to the fact it will never be as it was, ever again. It would have been far better to just say "That's all folks" and start up something new, rather than draw out something that will never be the same again. Personally I am bitterly disappointed that it has gone, and I won't be warming to a forum type "have your say" website. MREMag grew into something that in the end, no one could finish properly. Instead we get a test card!

 

I think that you are mixing up your metaphors - to pour oil on troubled waters is to calm down the situation, not to make it worse.

 

Sailors poured oil on stormy waters because it was heavier than water and floated, thus reducing the turbulence.

 

I suspect that you mean 'to pour oil on the flames' - which would have been appropriate.

 

Regards,

John Isherwood.

[aussiebrfan]

Not wishing to pour oil on troubled waters but I fear we have lost the MReMAG we knew and loved,  forever. The website crash in my opinion .. and it is only my opinion.. has been constructed to divert us all away and get us all used to the fact it will never be as it was, ever again. It would have been far better to just say "That's all folks" and start up something new, rather than draw out something that will never be the same again. Personally I am bitterly disappointed that it has gone, and I won't be warming to a forum type "have your say" website. MREMag grew into something that in the end, no one could finish properly. Instead we get a test card!

Try engaging ur brain before typing utter cr@p and unsubstantiated garbage!

[aussiebrfan]

Try engaging ur brain before typing utter cr@p and unsubstantiated garbage!

The above is my opinion which if you say will absolve you of all accountability or responsibility! Apparently.

Edited November 14, 2016 by aussiebrfan